


A Thousand Futures

by Akiko_Natsuko



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Timelines, Blood and Injury, Blood and Violence, Character Death, Choices, Death, Different Relationships, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Established Relationship, Fixing things, Friendship/Love, Guilt, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Memories, Missions Gone Wrong, Mistakes, Promises, Temporary Character Death, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-05
Updated: 2019-09-05
Packaged: 2020-10-10 07:41:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20524397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Akiko_Natsuko/pseuds/Akiko_Natsuko
Summary: Hank was gone, and Connor was a man possessed, trying to find out why it had happened and why he was still alive. The answers might lie with technology, and the possibility of an alternate timeline, a way to fix what had happened.Or might all go wrong again...and again.





	A Thousand Futures

**Author's Note:**

> My second fic for the Hankcon 2019 Reverse Big Bang. My partner was Deviart803 (Link to art to follow)

_Hank was falling._

_ Connor could pinpoint the exact moment he’d heard the retort from the first gun being fired. He knew how many nanoseconds it had taken for the bullet to cross the space, between their assailants and his partner. LED flickering and flashing, as he waited. A momentary pause, shock slowing the reaction and then Hank was crying out. Pain. Shock. Fear. Connor’s mind coldly analysed his partner’s voice, assigning name and meaning, almost without understanding and then Hank was falling, crumpling like a puppet whose strings had been cut._

_Get to Hank. Assess the wound. Apply pressure. Call for help. _

_ Connor’s mind was racing, priorities stacking up on top of one another even as he twisted out his assailant’s grasp, jerking his elbow back and feeling skin and bone break beneath the impact. His system was in overdrive. Pre-constructing his path to Hank. The next potential attack. The outcome of this situation. He stumbled, caught off guard from an attack that he hadn’t predicted. “CONNOR!” Hank had seen what was happening, catching himself, trying to come and help him. As though he hadn’t been shot, as though he didn’t have blood running down his front. Red. RED. _

_“Hank, stay there.” He couldn’t have Hank in the middle of this, not when he was already hurt, and he was merciless as he ducked the next blow, and immediately launched himself upwards, smashing his head into the man’s who’d attacked him. It was a fatal blow. He shoved the man backwards, the body… there was a flicker, his priorities struggling to keep up with the situation, but he was already moving. Hank. HANK. He heard the next shot even as he charged forwards, realising that Hank hadn’t listened and was trying to move towards him, staggering and stumbling. Faltering now, and his mind mechanically filed the sound, identifying the make and model of the gun, the type of ammunition used. _

_The likelihood of survival. _

_Thirty per cent and falling, as Hank jerked under the impact of the second shot. This time there was nothing stopping his fall, and he dropped like a stone, even as a third shot was fired. Connor barely registered the sound of the gunshot this time, he was moving, entirely focused on Hank who was now laid on the ground, blood beginning to pool around him. _

_Too much blood._

_ His fingers closed on his partner’s gun that had fallen from limp fingers when Hank had fallen, even as his system flashed a warning, pain flooding his system for a moment, blue welling up from his shoulder. Too late, he returned fire. Shooting blindly, trusting that his systems would do the rest, unable to focus on anything but Hank. _

_One._

_Two._

_Three._

_He missed the fourth shot, an error that shouldn’t have happened. But Hank…he was still moving, charging towards his partner, unable to see past the red. And it took him a half-second to realise that he had missed, a second shot slamming into his shoulder and now he was the one stumbling. Falling. His fingers locked around Hank’s gun. HOLD ON. For a moment, he let his priority shift, knowing that he couldn’t help Hank until the threat was gone, and he was going to help Hank. _

_He had to help Hank._

_ Two quick shots, both on target, and the shooter went down like a ton of bricks. Now he was out of bullets, but the last one seemed to have realised that he was the last man standing and their gazes met, a gaze that last seconds, but felt like an eternity. The other man understanding that he would die if he stayed and seeing the retribution to come. Connor memorising his face, system running its identification software, even as he was the one to turn away first, turning his back on the threat as he stumbled the last few feet to Hank’s side, abandoning the now useless weapon in the process._

_“Hank? Hank!” _

_No answer. _

_Eyes shut._

_Breathing laboured._

_ Asses the wounds. Two to the chest, Connor’s hands were shaking as he ghosted over the words, the probability of survival creeping down at the edge of his display. The third shot had taken Hank in the shoulder. His own shoulder burned, but he dismissed the pain. It was a low priority. He reached out, tapping Hank’s cheek, desperately trying to elicit a response, even as he scanned the wounds. The shoulder was a through and through, bleeding heavily, but less terrifying than the other two. Those weren’t through and through, the bullets still inside, threatening more damage. Hank was unresponsive, not even a hitch in his breathing to indicate that he was aware that Connor was there, and Connor tried to ignore the panic that blurred his thoughts, the probability of survival decreasing even further._

_Stop the bleeding._

_ He shrugged out of his coat, laying it over the wounds and pressing down, eyes locked on Hank’s face. It had to hurt, and yet there was nothing. Come on, Hank. He knew that his LED was flashing wildly, his priorities all of out of order as a very human panic consumed him. Come on Hank, please don’t do this._

_Call for help! CALL FOR HELP!_

_ Connor obeyed the imperative, relaying what had happened in an emotionless voice. A lie. But he didn’t want them to know that he was panicking. That he was scared. Those emotions were for Hank alone, for his partner. For the man who was dying beneath his hands. He barely waited for the promise that help was coming before he hung up, leaning in close._

_“Hank!” Nothing. But there was still a pulse, there was still…no… his vision went red, the systems that had been scanning Hank flashing across his eyes. Hank wasn’t breathing. “Don’t you dare!” He moved. Hank had always been on at him to learn things through experience, but right now, he was grateful for the databases he had access to, not trusting himself at the moment. Too late, too slow. A missed shot. He had already made too many mistakes tonight._

_He couldn’t make another one._

_ He moved to kneel beside Hank, burying the pain from his own injuries deep at the back of his mind, shaking as he placed the heel of his hand on Hank’s chest. _

_You’re not dying here, Hank. _

_Both hands were there now, interlocking, ready. _

_I’m not losing you._

_His shoulder burned, even his efforts to hold back the pain were not enough as he leaned forward to give compressions. _

_One…two…three………twenty-nine…thirty._

_Nothing. There was nothing, and Connor was panicking, spiralling, and he knew that his LED would be a solid red as he moved. Fingers brushing grey hair out of the way, a fleeting touch, before he was tilting Hank’s head, and pinching his nose._

_Breathe. Come on, breathe…_

_One breath._

_Two breath…_

_…. six breaths._

_Hank was still beneath his hands, and Connor felt sick even as he repeated the compressions and the breaths. Fighting the numbers, the pre-construction…the knowledge that it was too late. No. Come on, Hank. _

_ Why wasn’t he responding? Why wasn’t he fighting? Hank never gave up. Even when he had been at his worst, there had always been a spark, a stubbornness that wouldn’t let him falter. Come on, Hank, fight this, fight for me. There was a haze over his thoughts now, error messages crowding into his vision, trying to tell him the truth…he ignored them all. Logic be damned. Scans be damned. He wasn’t giving up. _

_He wasn’t losing Hank._

_ Time had no meaning, and he had no idea how long had passed before hands settled on his shoulders, and for a wild, desperate moment, he thought that it was Hank. That he had saved him, that he was alive. Hope and joy, crystallised and then shattered, becoming a thousand splintered pieces in his chest as he was pulled away from Hank. He started to fight and then saw the paramedic uniforms and the fight drained out of him. “Help him. Please, help him…” He was begging. Pleading. Ready to offer them everything. Deaf to their assurances, their questions as they took his position next to Hank… their hands moving with an urgent calmness that he hadn’t been able to find for himself, and he let himself hope again that maybe they could do what he hadn’t been able to do._

_ He wasn’t sure how long he had been stood there, a stander by, waiting for them to do what he hadn’t been able to. _

_Please…save him. _

_ Someone was trying to ask him what had happened, and he knew they were seeing the blood staining his front, both his and Hank’s. That they could see the signs of a fight, the lives that he had taken. He didn’t care. He couldn’t care, not until Hank… the flurry of activity was slowing, and he blinked, shoving past the man who had been trying to get answers from him. “What is going on?” He asked, and he didn’t recognise his voice. “What are you doing?” They weren’t working on Hank anymore, pulling back, leaving his partner laid out on the ground, Connor’s bloody coat pushed to the side and medical equipment surrounding his still form. _

_He still wasn’t breathing._

_“Save him.” It wasn’t a plea this time, it was a demand, even as his displays flashed again, trying to tell him the awful truth._

_“I’m sorry…” There were more words, other apologises, but Connor was deaf to them all. White noise filling his ears as he stumbled forward, shaking off the hands that tried to stop him, practically falling down at Hank’s side._

_“Hank…” He whispered, suddenly afraid to speak. Terrified that he wasn’t going to get a reply. Shaking worse than ever as he reached out again, fingers curling against Hank’s shoulder, shaking him lightly. “Hank?” Nothing, and there was something. A stillness that stretched out around them that broke through the haze, and with it came dread…and then a raw, aching realisation, and a sound that was half sob, half wail rose in the back of his throat. “HANK!”_

*

“HANK!”

Connor jerked upright, disconnecting from the charge point as he came awake, Hank’s name lingering on his lips. A nightmare, he tried to tell himself, but that was a lie. Even half-awake, he didn’t believe that. _A memory. _A memory that was so vivid that for a wild, terrifying moment he had honestly thought that he was back there, unable to see anything but red, and Hank’s too still features. He blinked, feeling tears in his eyes, his grief breaking through even in rest. Slowly, his vision cleared, and with it came the crushing realisation that he was at the Police Station. He was almost always there these days, because of what had happened…because of Hank… because of his failure.

He blinked again, catching the red of his LED in the glass of the android charging point, and he knew that if he looked closer, he would see his reflection. The exhausted, ruined features of someone that had lost everything. He stepped forward, an almost morbid curiosity propelling him to look. The face that stared back at him was that of a ghost, and he could barely hold his own gaze for more than second before he had to look away, unable to hide from the grief and guilt in the eyes that he hardly recognised.

_Hank._

He shivered, hands creeping up to tug at his hair. It had been months since that awful, fateful night, and even now he remembered it with perfect clarity. He always would, at least until he erased it from his memory, but he couldn’t do that, because that would mean eradicating Hank from his memories and he couldn’t do that, no matter how much it hurt to remember him. Not as much as it hurt to remember what had gone wrong, his miscalculations, the errors that he had made. Failures etched into his memory and driven deep by the trial that had followed Hank’s death.

How long had it been since then? Since he had stood in that courtroom, and in an empty, hollow voice related what had happened to people who couldn’t begin to comprehend what had happened. What he had lost. He wasn’t sure, each empty day blending into the next until it had all become a meaningless blur. That was fine. If it was a blur he didn’t need to think, he didn’t need to remember.

But he couldn’t forget.

He wouldn’t forget.


End file.
